TV Top 10s From Time and the Washington Post: ‘Transparent,’ ‘Fargo’ and ‘The Good Wife’

TV Top 10s From Time and the Washington Post: 'Transparent,' 'Fargo' and 'The Good Wife'

It’s still early days, but the TV Top 10 lists are starting to pile up, and a consensus is startling to jell. Look over the lists from Time’s James Poniewozik and the Washington Post’s Hank Stuever and you’ll notice quite a bit of overlap: Six out of 10 titles appear on both lists — Poniewozik’s entire Top 5, in fact. Most of them are no surprise: “Transparent” is likely to be to TV critics’ Top 10s what “Boyhood” will be to movie critics’: You don’t have to include it, but you need a decent reason for leaving it off. But it’s surprising that both cited “Silicon Valley,” which had to make a major course-correction halfway through its first season after Christopher Even Welch, whose turn as an eccentric tech mogul was the highlight of its first 5 episodes, dropped dead in the middle of production, and which critics like the New Yorker’s Emily Nussbaum have suggested looks even less insightful on the subject of the tech industry’s ingrained sexism in the wake of the Gamergate debacle. Still, that season-ending dick joke is a humdinger.

There are some notable omissions as well, including “True Detective,” which Stuever admits he’s “still firmly in the ‘so what?’ camp on.” Because the calendar year and the TV schedule don’t match up, network shows that are only halfway through their first seasons don’t make any appearances — you’ll get yours next year, “Jane the Virgin” — and Poniewozik took “Mad Men” out of the running due to AMC’s “half-season” shenanigans. But as always, it’s the idiosyncrasies that are most worth dwelling on: Poniewozik’s citation of “High Maintenance,” an online series which released only five new episodes this year; Stuever’s naming Ken Burns’ 14-hour “The Roosevelts” (he watched the whole thing!). Steuver’s article has plenty of honorable mentions, and Poniewozik’s is followed by a list of the year’s 10 best episodes, where shows like “The Knick” and “Bob’s Burgers” get some love.